Ross Ulbricht's Lawyer Requests Suppression Of Silk Road Evidence 54
Despite a failed attempt to have charges dismissed, the alleged Silk Road operator Ross Ulbricht's lawyer has filed a new motion to have evidence dismissed, citing recent court rulings in an argument that the Silk Road related searches were overly broad. From the article:
Dratel [Ulbricht's lawyer] argues in his 102-page motion filed last Friday that "the government conducted a series of 14 searches and seizures of various physical devices containing electronically stored information ('ESI'), and of ESI itself from Internet providers and other sources. Some of the ESI was obtained via search warrant, but other ESI was obtained via court order, and still other ESI was obtained without benefit of any warrant at all." ...
The defense lawyer argues that even the searches for which the government had a warrant were overbroad and based on evidence that may have been obtained illegally. The attorney writes: " As set forth ante, all of the searches and seizures conducted pursuant to warrants and/or orders were based on the initial ability of the government to locate the Silk Road Servers, obtain the ESI on them, and perform extensive forensic analysis of that ESI. Thus, all subsequent searches and seizures are invalid if that initial locating the Silk Road Servers, obtaining their ESI, and gaining real-time continued access to those servers, was accomplished unlawfully."
The defense lawyer argues that even the searches for which the government had a warrant were overbroad and based on evidence that may have been obtained illegally. The attorney writes: " As set forth ante, all of the searches and seizures conducted pursuant to warrants and/or orders were based on the initial ability of the government to locate the Silk Road Servers, obtain the ESI on them, and perform extensive forensic analysis of that ESI. Thus, all subsequent searches and seizures are invalid if that initial locating the Silk Road Servers, obtaining their ESI, and gaining real-time continued access to those servers, was accomplished unlawfully."
Watch my hands! (Score:2)
Now watch my hands. Are you watching my hands? Good. Now, Presto!
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Re: Watch my hands! (Score:2)
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The fact that you think "opponent of government abuse" equals "proponent of Silk Road" speaks volumes. You are the dangerous kind of citizen, who, unable to distinguish between the two, enables the "Think of the Children" approach to rights erosion.
Precisely. Ulbricht is probably guilty but there seems be unpunished crimes going on by the government as well. The claim as to how they found him seems like a cover story. Given Snowden revelations its obvious the government little concern for the law when it comes to privacy these days. If the constitution was being actually followed, those that engaged in mass surveillance would be facing a judge and jail time. Unfortunately because lawmakers are the one's authorizing it, they give themselves a get-out
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You are the dangerous kind of citizen, who, unable to distinguish between the two, enables the "Think of the Children" approach to rights erosion.
I'm the kind of citizen who doesn't take a blatant criminal's lawyer's word for anything. I'm all for people being able to buy and sell whatever they like, but I don't automatically take the capitalist's word over the socialist's. The rewards for turning in someone running an operation like this would be astronomical. If one is actually as scrupulous with one's identity as he thought he was, then it would take a tipoff to bring them down anyway. There's no honor among, well, anyone really. The fact that you
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You clearly have no honor. A person with honor would never say such a thing, as they would, having honor themselves, know this to be untrue.
Don't be an idiot. Parallel Reconstruction isn't some kind of myth. It is a known fact that this does happen. Ergo, concluding that anyone who wants to know if it happened here is a "proponent of Silk Road" is phenomenally stupid. Of course up until know I had assumed yo
Normal lawyer stuff (Score:5, Insightful)
We all know his lawyer has the burden to basically try anything and everything between now and (possible) sentencing to get the client off or reduced penalty. The system is adversarial on purpose. What will be interesting to some of us is to see if there was anything used here to find him that is really pushing the limits right. I mean the official story I hear is that he was found with old fashion leg work more than anything else. I am interested to know how true that might be. I think a lot of us are worried some of that mega NSA power is being serendipitously shared with law enforcement, and then they cover it up. We have some reason to think that is and has happened.
Re:Normal lawyer stuff (Score:5, Informative)
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No no, the gathering of the information becomes legal. Using it in a "normal" case is an entire different story.(according to the lawyer) You cannot make the gathering of everything digital that is happening for security, and then using this information in a "normal" drugs case. If he tried to do a terrorist action, then it would disappears in the drawer. However This is a normal criminal case, and in such a case the police has to follow certain procedures.
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This is a normal criminal case, and in such a case the police has to follow certain procedures.
No, they don't. It's just as much a free for all with them as it is with the feds. The authorities only have to cover their tracks and not get caught.
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Re:Normal lawyer stuff (Score:4, Insightful)
I mean the official story I hear is that he was found with old fashion leg work more than anything else. I am interested to know how true that might be. I think a lot of us are worried some of that mega NSA power is being serendipitously shared with law enforcement, and then they cover it up. We have some reason to think that is and has happened.
If a tool exists that eases the human labor necessary to accomplish a task, and that tool is within reach of the aforementioned human, the tool will not sit idle.
It would be fairly easy to work backwards from the fruit of the poisonous tree with some old fashioned leg work. It's not that we know that's what happened, but it merits a mention for the defendant's day in court.
Re:Normal lawyer stuff (Score:4, Interesting)
Based on the indictments it's hard to know how he was found. The indictment certainly gives a plausible explanation for how it happened - he was sloppy about linkage of his personal and alter-ego accounts online, but as noted in the articles, there are certain gaps and inconsistencies in the story and parts of it may have been filled out retroactively (the notorious "parallel construction"). Apparently what his lawyer is hoping, is that they get a judge who feels like putting the FBI in their place with respect to such issues, and it turns out that they found the Silk Road servers via some NSA related trickery then worked backwards to find Ulbricht, then worked out a plausible but untrue alternative explanation for how he was located. Such a thing if found to have happened could plausibly throw a spanner in the entire prosecution.
However, it seems a long shot.
Re:Normal lawyer stuff (Score:5, Interesting)
Adversarial? (Score:2, Insightful)
CCE is a manager of drug dealers (Score:5, Informative)
CCE has nothing to do with being in prison. The requirements for conviction under Continuing Criminal Enterprise are that the defendant:
Managed or supervised
a series of
felony
drug offenses
involving at least four other people.
That actually sounds a LOT like "running a drug market", which about right.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki... [wikipedia.org]
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was, but not really. 99% of clist Ian isn't hooker (Score:2)
99% of the ads on Craigslist are for something other than hookers.
Craigslist wasn't specifically designed for illegal activity.
Silk Road was designed for illegal activity, and was mostly used for illegal activity.
Further, Craigslist took care of the hooker issue when it became a problem. The hookers are on Backpage now.
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exactly how is CCE trial "fuck due process? (Score:3)
There is a lot of crap worth complaining about, and I think you've missed it if you're complaining about CCE.
How exactly is CCE a "fuck due process law"? A defendant is indicted, tried by jury. The jury concludes the evidence shows that beyond a reasonable doubt, the defendant directed multiple felonies. Where exactly is due process missing?
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Specifically, the purpose is to ensure you're as equal before the law as the contents of your wallet allow. Unless you pissed off someone more powerful, of course, in which case they will be confiscated.
Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus (Score:2)
Reasonable tenet for legal admissibility of evidence? Absolutely.
Prosecutors and law enforcement personnel should have to operate within the law in order to exercise its enforcement.
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Prosecutors and law enforcement personnel should have to operate within the law in order to exercise its enforcement
Yes, they most definitely should, but this is the united states legal system you are talking about. One where prosecutors and law enforcement have been ordered to perjure themselves by the federal government in order to keep questionable surveillance technologies (such as stingray) out of the courts eye. One where prosecutors and law enforcement have been encouraged by the federal government to use evidence laundering (parallel reconstruction) to hide the fact that evidence is routinely being illegally acqu
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Actually, in fairness, I don't believe Silk Road did allow this.
More what he is accused of is trying to hire a hitman after being blackmailed, threatening both him and his customers.
Although, from the looks of things, what he really did was get scammed by a blackmailer and a fake hitman.
I find it hard to be so black and white about a situation where threats are actually potentially putting lives on the line, its not like he had other recourse. The blackmailer was a former conspirator of his....honestly....
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Rights do not exist for unassuming grandmothers. They exist for dirtbags as well.
"If the First Amendment will protect a scumbag like me, then it will protect all of you. Because I'm the worst." -Larry Flynt
OT: First vs. Second Amendment (Re:lol) (Score:3)
Sure... I just wish, the Second Amendment was interpreted as widely as the First.
If the First was read as narrowly as the Second is currently, the freedom of speech — which, among other things, once meant Larry's freedom to sell porn — would've been limited to petitioning the government. And only for redress of grievances...
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For as long as I can remember, both the GOP and the DNC have had these things outside (WAYYYYYYYY outside) their nominating conventions.
While Reagan was in many ways a shitbag, the correct answer is "a pox on both their houses".
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And only after a cooling off period.
Sounds fishy (Score:1)
Something sounds fishy, at least according to the defense the government didn't provide the evidence suggesting how they knew of the the location of the servers being used to commit illegal acts. It could be another case of "Parallel Construction" which may involve illegal interception of mail and communications without a court order. It almost sounds like they just went to a Judge with no evidence just "their word" that they knew something illegal was going at this location and the judge just rubber stam
How soon will the idiots start posting stupid law? (Score:2)
Theories like "the IRS won't tax it because it's law".
Or it's hearsay and ignoring the 27 some exceptions to the hearsay rules?
Even this story already borders on getting it wrong. "Fruit of the poisonous tree" can be gotten around by if you can demonstrate that the same evidence would inevitably have been obtained by legal means that they were undertaking.
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Sorry I meant "the IRS won't tax it because it's not currency".
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And the first sentence produces moron number one.
Wouldn't it be ironic? (Score:4, Interesting)
If a court did throw out all the evidence, and as a result they had to return all the Sold Bitcoin [theguardian.com]?
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That was what I was curious about. Would the government have to give back the proceeds of the sale or the actual value at the time of seizure or the amount they are worth now?
What the government would do is one thing (most likely they'd say this was seized property and it does not need to be returned - DEA can seize and sell property even if you are found innocent in court, amazingly enough).
However, if it wanted to do the right thing the most appropriate thing to do would be to just return the same quantity of bitcoins that was seized, perhaps by buying them on the market. Then nobody has to argue about the value of a bitcoin - they're just returning what was taken, even if it
Servers equals The Body in this argument (Score:3)
In a homicide investigation, it really helps if you actually have a dead body with which to continue working with. What the defense here is saying effectively, "you haven't found the body, have you? So where is your case then? And certainly, what exactly are the legal merits of your case based upon the legal evidence available, so you claim?"
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Moron #2.
Just ask that Peterson guy in California.
Or Hans Reiser.
You gotta give him credit (Score:3)
You gotta give the guy credit. He's taking every possible spin he can to get his guilty client off.
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Looks more like he is throwing everything he can think of at the wall in order to find something that might work. Given how slowly the wheels of justice turn it delays the eventual reckoning but Judges tire of the technique eventually [arstechnica.com]
It's fun to just declare things like guilt (Score:1)
Makes sense, your illegitimate state is taking every possible spin to imprison Ulbricht for an unjust law.
Without lying, and best interests might be rehab (Score:2)
> Even if they know that the client is guilty and would like to see them die a horrible death they have to do their best to defend them in court
Yep. More specifically, they are supposed to act in the best interest of the client, but without lying or helping the client lie.
Spin is required, allowing or participating in actual lying is called "subornation of perjury" and it is grounds for disbarment and a maximum of about five years in prison.
Also, they are not required to try to "get their client off".